Hennepin Theatre
About this property
The Orpheum Theatre is a historic venue located in downtown Minneapolis. It is one of four restored theaters on Hennepin Avenue, alongside the State Theatre, the Pantages Theatre, and the Shubert Theatre (now The Cowles Center). The building opened on October 16, 1921, originally named the Hennepin Theater. Its inaugural performers included the Marx Brothers, with over 70,000 guests attending during the opening week. Billed as the largest vaudeville house in the country at the time, the Orpheum became a major platform for entertainers such as Jack Benny, George Burns, and Fanny Brice. The Orpheum featured a playroom and daycare off the mezzanine lobby, and backstage, it had eight floors of dressing rooms. As vaudeville declined in the 1930s and 1940s, the Orpheum shifted to being one of Minneapolis's major cinema houses, screening films like Gone with the Wind, which sold out every show for three weeks in 1940. Additionally, it hosted famous big bands, including Benny Goodman, Tommy Dorsey, and Count Basie. In 1959, Ted Mann, who owned six other downtown Minneapolis theaters, including the Pantages, purchased the Orpheum and began bringing in touring productions such as My Fair Lady and Fiddler on the Roof. Movies continued to be shown as well, with the 1965 James Bond film Thunderball breaking box office records. The Orpheum also set a record in Minneapolis for first-run engagements of Best Picture Oscar winners—nine in total—including From Here to Eternity in 1953 and The Godfather in 1972. The theater features two distinct structures: a long, narrow lobby that extends from a slim facade along Hennepin Avenue, and an auditorium that is set back and parallels Hawthorne Avenue. The beautifully restored lobby includes six terra cotta bas relief sculptures, while the auditorium is extravagantly decorated with intricate plaster work, garlands, swags, medallions, and other ornate details. The ceiling boasts a dome adorned with 30,000 squares of aluminum leaf. Currently, the theater seats 2,579 guests—1,500 in the main floor and 1,100 in the three-level balcony—making it the largest among the three theaters on Hennepin Avenue. Productions that have premiered at the Orpheum include Victor/Victoria, The 101 Dalmatians Musical, the pre-Broadway world premiere of The Lion King, and the national tour premiere of Elton John and Tim Rice's Aida. In 1988, the Minneapolis Community Development Agency acquired the Orpheum Theatre from Bob Dylan (who owned the Orpheum from 1979 to 1988) and his brother, David Zimmerman. The Minneapolis City Council wanted to revitalize Hennepin Avenue as an entertainment destination. The nearby State Theatre had undergone renovation and reopened in 1991. However, the Orpheum had a deeper stage that could accommodate larger sets necessary for productions such as Miss Saigon, which was set to open on January 14, 1994. The city agreed to finance the renovation by issuing bonds to be repaid through a $2 surcharge on tickets for both the Orpheum and the State.
Location
Categories
Property data from the National Register of Historic Places, National Park Service (public domain).
Description adapted from Wikipedia under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
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Questions about this property
When was Hennepin Theatre listed on the National Register?
Hennepin Theatre was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on January 19, 1996.
What type of historic resource is Hennepin Theatre?
Hennepin Theatre is classified as a building in the National Register of Historic Places.
What is the period of significance for Hennepin Theatre?
The period of significance for Hennepin Theatre is recorded as the industrial era.
Can I research the history near Hennepin Theatre?
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